Taking Care of Wounded Soldiers
by ErinisMagic
Summary: Dean's thoughts as his brother lies in a comatose state (s06e22 The Man Who Knew To Much).


Dean felt terror wash through his body the moment he saw Castiel move to put his hand against Sam's head. Panic struck him motionless, and he and Bobby froze, watching helplessly as Cas tore down the wall, disappearing seconds later. Sam's eyes rolled to the back of his head and he swayed for a moment before falling forward.

"Sam!" Dean cried, rushing forward to catch his brother. He knelt down to lessen the risk of him dropping Sam and turned him over in his arms. "Sammy?"

For a moment, Bobby didn't know what to say. Dean's voice cracked as if he were about to cry, and when he looked up at Bobby, his eyes shone brightly with unshed tears. Sam's eyes had closed, and his head lolled about as Dean shook his shoulders, trying desperately to rouse him. "C'mon," Bobby said once he had found his words again, "let's get him outta here."

Dean nodded, looking back down at Sam for a minute before thrusting one arm under his knees, keeping the other on his back, carrying him bridal style back to the Impala. For once, he didn't have any complaints about handing over the keys to someone else, sitting down in the back seat with his brother as Bobby sped down the road back to his house.

Sam didn't stir once during the drive, didn't even flinch as Dean carried him down to the panic room. He put Sam down on the thin, lumpy mattress, grabbing his chin and turning his head towards him. In all of the storybooks and movies, whenever the hero was fighting off some awful thing in their head, they always had their eyebrows drawn tight or they whimpered in their sleep. Sam did neither of these things, and that almost made it worse. He was so far away from the land of the living, and Dean began to worry that he might get stuck there.

Dean heard Bobby's footsteps come up behind him, pausing as the man hung in the doorway, unsure of what to do. "We need to angel-proof this room, pronto," Dean told him, voice rough and tired but still carrying enough force and urgency to make it clear that it was necessary.

"Dean-" Bobby started, but cut himself off when Dean turned back to look at him. There was a frantic look in his eyes that told him that Dean wouldn't so much as sit down until he was sure that his brother was completely safe. Bobby sighed in defeat knowing that the sooner they got all of this done the sooner he might be able to convince Dean to take it easy. " Alright," he said, "let's get started."

Once all of the symbols had been drawn, Dean checked that they were all right. Then he double checked,then triple-checked, leaving nothing to chance. He was just about to check them once more when Bobby put his hands on his shoulders.

"You gotta take a break now, boy. At least sit down, or something."

Dean shook his head, casting his eyes around the room before letting them come to rest on Sam. What if it wasn't enough? What if something got in? Sam was helpless; he could be torn apart in ten seconds flat and it would be all Dean's fault for not protecting him, for letting something slip in because he had messed up and not checked everything as well as he should have.

Bobby seemed to sense where Dean's train of thought was bringing him. "Look, Dean. Nothin's getting in here, so just snap outta it already! I'm just as worried about Sam as you are, but there ain't nothin' we can do about it!"

Dean sighed heavily and all but collapsed into the chair next to the bed. Tiredly, he scrubbed a hand over his face, looking back up at Bobby as if to say _'What do I do now?'_

Bobby gave Dean's shoulder a few reassuring pats. "I'm gonna go get some food," he said. "Why don't you take a nap or something." With that, he headed back up the stairs and into the kitchen, wondering what he could make that he could convince Dean to eat.

Once he was alone, Dean looked down on Sam's expressionless face. "Hey, Sammy," he said softly, running a hand through Sam's hair like he used to do to calm Sam down when they were young. "I'm right here Sam, remember that. I'm not going anywhere. Whenever you feel like waking up, I'll be here, okay?"

Bobby returned a few minutes later with two sandwiches, which he and Dean ate in silence. After, they began discussing how they might be able to stop Cas, which seemed to become harder and harder the longer they talked. When Bobby eventually announced that he was going to get some sleep while he still could, Dean opted to remain next to Sam, his only explanation to Bobby being that he promised.

The next morning, Dean sat next to the bed, calling out to his younger brother. "Sam. Sammy? Sammy? Come on, snap out of it." His words were useless. Needing to find something to take his mind off everything, he put on the radio and began pacing around the room until Bobby came down to check on them.

After Bobby left to try to find a lead on Cas, Dean went back to pacing around the panic room. It was nearing noon when he noticed a small flashlight sitting on the table. He stared at it for a moment before thinking that he should check Sam's pupils. That was something they did on all of those doctor shows, right? If the pupil didn't get smaller in the light, that meant that something was wrong with the person's head. He tried it out and had to bite back the worry the results brought; unresponsive.

The rest of the day was a blur of Bobby passing in and out to keep him updated on the search for Cas and worrying about Sam. That is, however, until Sam began convulsing on the bed.

Dean had had his back turned when it started, but he had been waiting all day to hear something from Sam. When he started making those small, choked noises in the back of his throat, Dean whipped his head around so fast he thought his neck might snap, but that didn't matter. All that mattered was Sam.

It was like something out of one of those crappy Hollywood horror movies, when one of the characters was possessed and they were lifted up by their chest. But this wasn't a movie. This was real, and this was Sam, and Dean was terrified for his brother.

"Sammy? SAM!" Dean cried, rushing back to the bed and laying a hand on his brother's chest as he writhed about. Then, as suddenly as it had started, it stopped, and Sam was left lying on the bed as limply as before.

Bobby, who had been upstairs, had heard Dean yelling and bolted back down to the panic room. He didn't even have to say a word before Dean started explaining what had happened to him.

"What the hell is going on Bobby?" he asked, a panicked look in his eyes. "He just started thrashing all around and he sounded like he was choking and..." he trailed off in the middle of the sentence, stopping himself before he could admit to how frightened he had been. He looked to Bobby for some kind of explanation, but found none.

The next time Bobby came down, he wasn't alone. At last, they had found Balthazar. Getting the address of Crowley's hideout meant that they could stop him and Cas from opening Purgatory but, more importantly (at least to Dean), it meant that they could make Cas fix Sam. He let his eyes rest sadly on the figure on the bed for a moment more before starting to pack up all of the things he would need.

Dean packed quickly, but instead of helping Bobby finish with his packing, once he was done he sat back down at Sam's bedside. He didn't want to leave him alone when he was so helpless, but he didn't really have a choice.

"Time's up, Dean."

"Just a second." He took one last, sad look at Sam before reaching into his pocket and pulling out the paper with the address Balthazar had given them. "Alright, this is where we're gonna be, Sam," he told his brother. "So you get your lazy ass out of bed and come meet us. Sammy, please."

Sam showed no signs of stirring, so Dean walked to the other side of his bed, putting down the paper and a gun next to Sam's pillow. He tried not to think about how he was breaking his promise to his brother, but the thought slipped through anyway. _I'm sorry, Sam,_ he thought. _Just get better._


End file.
